Steeling himself again

With a sequel to his once-famed rath yatra, LK Advani wants to remind everyone who's the BJP's big wheel.

Former BJP iron man LK Advani is on a roll and he means to prove this when he rolls out the sequel to his once-famed rath yatra, this time not to institutionalise Hindutva, but to eradicate corruption. The iron in LK Advani's soul is clearly getting a little rusty when he has to reinvent not one, but two ideas. The first was his dramatic gesture in Parliament, when he, like his nemesis Indira Gandhi, asked to be arrested, arms thrown up in the air. And then, he nicks old

Anna Hazare calling card and says he will hit the road to raise awareness about corruption. And what a revelation that will be.

Now the cynical among you may say that this is just a political ploy to remain relevant. But, we ask, what is wrong with that? Here is a man not content to sit around knitting socks for the grandkids, who does not want to be nuisance around the party office and who wants to remind the great Indian population, especially south of the Vindhyas that the

BJP is still around, and not just in the well-rounded personality of the new party president Nitin Gadkari. Did he look as fetching as Indira Gandhi with his 'give me handcuffs or the collected volumes of Guru Golwalkar' histrionics? No, but it certainly surprised his own party more than his opponents. Nothing like an old thespian looking for more curtain calls, is there? Just when it looks like it might be plain old curtains for some thespians in the ruling party.

This is also an indication that the old boy still has the kind of stomach for a long stint on the road, albeit in a motorised rath, while poor Gadkari collapsed in a heap after a small rally in the balmy confines of the capital. So, we look forward to when the Lalmobile will wheel out. The leadership may not be turning cartwheels with joy, but it will settle once and for all the BJP's dilemmas of whether there are wheels within wheels and ultimately, who is the party's big wheel.